


In the Meadow of Another Country

by orphan_account



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Established Braeden/Derek Hale, Fluff, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, Lydia Martin & Stiles Stilinski Friendship, M/M, McCall Pack, Minor Danny Mahealani/Stiles Stilinski, Minor Lydia Martin/Stiles Stilinski, Pining, Stiles Has Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-09
Packaged: 2018-11-11 11:46:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11147745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: All the times the tropes failed Scott and Stiles, and one time they didn't need them.





	In the Meadow of Another Country

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a year ago and forgot about it, which means that it doesn't take the most recent season into account. (Not that I've bothered all that much with trying to stay canon-compliant, as is usual once I get exasperated.) 
> 
> Title is from [here](http://www.thespectrum.com/story/opinion/blogs/educationitself/2016/02/24/poem--day---vapor-sara-eliza-johnson/80722772/).

They’ve been awfully busy, the last two months of senior year, basically a new monster every week, like some horrible homage to Buffy except without the masses of fellow Chosen Ones ready to awaken and fight on their side. Instead, there’s a True Alpha and a werecoyote and a banshee and some other werewolves, plus Stiles. Always plus Stiles. And sometimes Braeden, who isn’t really a member of the pack but is definitely an ally. Derek finally started texting Scott every once in a while after six months of total silence, and that’s how they know Braeden tells him everything, because suddenly Scott’s phone will light up and it’s Derek talking in all caps about some poorly-worded treaty his mother made with a coven of witches back before she was even an Alpha, that somehow Scott’s pack has violated despite not having been born at the time. So that’s nice.

All in all, Stiles has been pretty grateful that Danny broke up with him before Christmas break, although at the time it was pretty rugged. He knew Danny was graduating early, and he knew Danny was going to MIT, but somehow he never did the math and arrived at the obvious solution that they were going to have to split up until the words were already coming out of Danny’s mouth. He managed to hide his (completely idiotic, in retrospect) shock, return Danny’s goodbye kiss with a modicum of grace (completely out of character, in retrospect), and get all the way home without crying about it (completely unexpected, in retrospect, since he’d kept waiting to bawl and hoping no one he knew would see him as he sobbed his way through town). His dad rose to his feet as soon as Stiles came into the house, and Stiles made a beeline straight to the sheriff’s shoulder, but he ended up just hugging his dad instead. Apparently even his tear ducts know he’s too old for drama over things that aren’t a huge deal in the long run.

Lydia, of course, realized this was going to happen the instant Danny and Stiles started dating. He tells her about the breakup while they go over some chemistry notes—they’re both doing dual enrollment at the community college—and somewhat to his surprise, he manages to sound precisely as resigned-but-fine as he feels. Lydia taps her pen against her mouth, says, “I told you I was done with high school boys, but honestly you’re as close to graduating as makes no difference,” and takes her dress off before he’s done more than gape at her. “You’re still interested, right?” she adds as an afterthought.

“I—yes—” In fact he’s kind of weirded out by how interested he is, this soon after getting dumped, but then she’s straddling him on her bed, all scarlet-haired grace and surety, and his thoughts dwindle down to how silky-smooth her skin feels beneath his palms. When she pushes up the hem of his shirt, he automatically raises his arms above his head to help. She lowers her lips to his, and he kisses her back before he remembers he probably shouldn’t. “But—I didn’t think you wanted to date anyway?”

She’s already working his zipper. He wriggles his pants off, along with his socks, while she unclasps her bra and then braces her hands on his chest. “This isn’t dating, Stiles.”

By this point Stiles knows he has lipstick all over his mouth and he’s pretty sure he looks like a joke, but she kisses him again instead of laughing at him. Her face, fond and overly patient while she waits for him to catch up, tells him this is a strictly hygienic transaction between friends, so he helps her put the condom on in the spirit of camaraderie.

Their study dates are pretty fun, after that, until even those succumb to the weight of the responsibility they both feel to fight the evil that encroaches on city limits on a regular basis.

It’s just as well, because right before it inevitably ends with Lydia (not that their arrangement is ever more than convenient for either of them), Stiles notices that he’s starting to stare at Scott’s arms a little _too_ hard whenever they’re in the weight room. That’s a problem he explains away to himself as perfectly reasonable jealousy of the physical prowess Alphadom bestowed upon his best friend. The warm fuzzy feeling he notices mushing up his chest cavity whenever Scott does something particularly heroic, like _literally rescuing a litter of kittens out of a tree_ (because he _needed_ those extra points on the Good Guy Scale of Worthiness), he explains away as appreciative friendship. And the way his heart does a little leap of anticipation every time Scott’s name lights up his phone? Definitely just nervousness about whatever new disaster has decided to slime its way into Beacon Hills.

Scott seems oblivious to the entire thing. Except there is no _thing_ for him to notice anyway.

Immediately after graduation, Lydia takes off for England, ostensibly to visit her future alma mater, i.e. Cambridge, but also to give the pack a dry run to prepare for her longer absence. “You’ll have to get used to operating without me for a few years anyway,” she tells the pack, with the wide eyes and determined set to her jaw that means she’s having second thoughts about the entire thing. “So if someone dies while I’m gone, I don’t want to hear any complaints about how you didn’t know until the police radioed.”

(Which turns out not to be an issue, since she sleep-texts Stiles and Scott five times within the first week.)

So it comes down to this: one month after graduation, Stiles finds himself back on the damn lacrosse field, facing down Peter Hale (who never stays dead, he’s like the Mirror Universe version of Lazarus or something) over an unconscious woman. Only this time, he doesn’t have to do it alone, because Scott arcs over his body and stands between Peter and him, in full Alpha wolf form for the very first time. His teeth are bared, a vicious growl tears from his throat, and for once Stiles knows that Scott would be good with killing someone.

Peter backs down, naturally, since his philosophy is as it’s always been: “Live to fight another day.” That’s to be expected.

What Stiles _didn’t_ expect, and what comes as a totally unwelcome surprise, is how his heart gives a gigantic _thud_ when Scott morphs back to human and turns to smile at him, once they’re back at Stiles’ place. It kind of has a little to do with the stark-naked factor (an Alpha body is a _perfect_ body, all right?), but it has more to do with the way Scott looks him over, all concern and happy light in his eyes.

“You okay?” he asks, grabbing Stiles by the shoulders.

“Yeah, of course, you’d know if I weren’t anyway,” Stiles replies, and then the incredible _badass_ factor is too much to go unremarked anymore. “Dude! You fucking did it! You made the full transformation into a wolf!”

Scott ducks his head a little, but he’s grinning in a way that means he agrees that it was kind of a huge deal. “I was worried about you. Peter’s the worst.” And then the grin grows until it takes over his entire face. “But that? Was _fucking awesome._ ”

Then they do the high-five routine they came up with in sixth grade and go in to eat some nachos. Which is normal! The whole _thing_ is normal.

Except Stiles isn’t sure he’s normal at all. The fact that he just realized he’s in love with Scott probably means the answer is no.

 

The phone rings five times, and Scott’s resigned himself to texting before Malia picks up the phone and says, “ _What_ ,” in a tone that says she already knows what.

To be fair, she’s not wrong. “I don’t know what to do,” he blurts, instead of what he meant to say, which was _pack meeting at Deaton’s office at six._

“Oh my _God_.” Malia has very little patience with anyone else’s interpersonal woes, and that’s probably because hardly anyone else has experienced half of hers. “I don’t give a shit, Scott, do whatever makes you happy.”

“I don’t know what that is!”

“Is this the only reason you called?”

Oh. “No, actually, I wanted to make sure you’re coming to Deaton’s tonight.”

“Yeah, Hayden told me to. You could’ve texted.”

He snorts. “No I couldn’t have. You hate when I text you.”

“Because it’s _always bad news,_ Scott. If it’s not ‘we’re all gonna die, again,’ then it’s ‘I think I might be in love with your ex-boyfriend.’”

Now that he thinks about it, asking Malia for advice might have been the wrong move. It’s just that he would always talk to _Stiles_ about trouble like this, and he doesn’t know who else to turn to now. “I’m sorry. But you’re coming to the meeting, so, good. See ya.”

Instead of hanging up, she lets out a breath of frustration. “I hate people. I hate dating. I hate people who date. Why can’t we all just mate when we feel like it and then walk away when we don’t? God.”

Scott waits for a few seconds, but she just breathes into the speaker some more, in a way that she has to know is annoying as shit for anyone with enhanced ears. “Okay?”

“Do you want me to ask him if he likes you back?”

He can’t restrain the laugh that bubbles out at that. Being a coyote throughout your middle school years can leave some weird gaps in socialization. “Um, no. But thank you.”

She hangs up without further ado.

“I could ask him, if you want me to,” Liam offers from the door to Scott’s bedroom, and that little shit has been learning how to mask his heartbeat, which is another complication Scott doesn’t need.

Scott barely conceals his start of surprise. Only the sure knowledge that Liam will never let him live it down keeps his shoulders steady. “Ask who what?”

“I was standing here the whole time.” Liam is justifiably smug about that, and he crosses the line into _unbearably_ smug when Scott can’t control his wince. “I _knew_ you liked him, I knew it.”

Scott gives him an unimpressed look. “That’s like me saying I _knew_ you liked Mason. Of course I like Stiles. We’ve been best friends forever.”

Liam widens his eyes until he could rival Bambi for the appearance of harmless adorableness. “BFFs who want to make out. Which I don’t want to do with Mason, for the record.”

Breathing out a genuine laugh, Scott pockets his phone and starts gathering up his computer and papers for the meeting. “Stiles doesn’t wanna make out with me. Help me with this stuff, will you?”

With unusual tact, Liam refrains from pointing out that an Alpha who can’t handle a laptop and a couple of pens with a notebook isn’t worth his own red eyes. Instead, he holds out Scott’s computer bag, open so Scott can load it up. “I notice that you didn’t make that sentiment reciprocal _._ ”

Scott holds out his fist for an answering bump. “Excellent use of the SAT word-a-day app.”

“You’re not distracting me from this one.” Liam zips up the bag. “You _do_ want to make out with Stiles. Can I start calling him Papa Stiles now? I have a feeling it’s really going to piss him off so I’ve been wanting to do it for like a year.”

“Don’t call him Papa Stiles. I have a hard enough time keeping him from bickering with you all the time.” Scott shoulders the bag and directs a hard glare at Liam, which his beta responds to with an inappropriate amount of hilarity in his expression. Scott manages to keep the glare in place for about five seconds before he relents. “Do you think I should tell him? What if he doesn’t feel the same way? I don’t want to make things awkward.”

The amusement vanishes, replaced by genuine confusion. “Wait, are you actually asking me? Hell if I know. It kind of seems like it’d be easier, though. I mean, like you said, you’ve been friends since before you liked him, right? So if he doesn’t feel the same way, you can just keep being friends. No harm, no foul.”

Scott tries to remember when he started falling in love with Stiles and fails. One day everything was the same, and the next day the way Stiles put on his lacrosse helmet was so sexy Scott’s mouth watered. It snuck up on him so gradually that he realized he wanted to kiss Stiles, and simultaneously realized he’d wanted to kiss him for months. Maybe it took awhile to notice because it feels different than it did with Allison or Kira, or because he and Stiles already made out a few times back when they were thirteen, and it wasn’t a big deal, just faded out of their friendship in the same low-key way it had faded in. He doesn’t have to wonder what Stiles’ mouth would feel like licking into his own, because he already knows. Although probably it’s different now, since both of them have had more practice and they’re a lot bigger… Stiles’ body would _definitely_ feel different pressed against his.

That thought turns his brain hazy, so he shoves it away. “Maybe I can pay attention to how he smells, see if that tells me anything.” He shouldn’t be discussing this with Liam when he’s a technical adult. He shouldn’t be discussing this with a beta when he’s the Alpha. He always forgets how much he needs Stiles to talk to until he can’t talk to Stiles about something.

Liam shrugs. “Sure, dude. Give it a shot. Stand close to him and breathe down his neck. See if he gets goosebumps. I did that to Hayden for like three months when we started dating.”

Scott gives him a _come on, man_ look and heads out the door. “That’s because you were creeping her out, not because she thought you were hot.”

“It can be both!” Liam follows him.

It turns out that he can’t get a good read on Stiles, though, because Stiles shows up drowning in cologne, like a fifth-grader who just discovered he has body odor, to the point where even Deaton is giving him a side-eye or two while they discuss the latest threat (which happens to be an incubus).

“ _God_ you reek,” Malia complains, and covers her nose with her shirt collar. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Sorry. Broke a bottle on the floor and didn’t have time to shower.” Stiles’ heartbeat stays steady, but then again there’s no reason for him to lie.

He does bring twice as much research as Scott on how to take an incubus out, and he’s as helpful as ever, although he fidgets more than is normal anymore. Ever since the nogitsune, he’s become more still than not, in a way that used to signal things were so bad that he wasn’t sure they’d make it. Now he’s… well, he’s probably never sure they’ll make it. Scott never is, no matter how much the pack teases him about optimism. So maybe the stillness is just waiting.

Somehow, no matter how many times Scott tries to angle his way unobtrusively to Stiles’ side, Stiles always ends up on the opposite side of the table, and the room. Even though Stiles talks _at_ him, he doesn’t talk _to_ him.

They end up at a gross motel just outside city limits, one of the places that charges by the hour. Most of the clientele go in and out like clockwork, accompanied by their hosts or hostesses, but there’s one door that stays closed.

Stiles puts his binoculars down and talks for the first time since they parked across the street. “I think it’s feeding off what these people would do anyway, instead of making them do it.” He’s still avoiding eye contact, but sometimes he does that when he’s nervous, which anyone would feel if they had his previous experience with evil spirits.

Scott realizes after a moment that he’s been so busy looking at the way moonlight silvers Stiles’ profile that he forgot to answer. “So… what does that mean? Is it not evil? Should we just let it feed and leave?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen anyone go into a room and stay, which they would if it were killing them, right? Unless it already had someone in there before we got here.”

“Let’s get closer so we can listen.”

Once he steps out of the Jeep and motions to the others, they fall into V-formation behind him. It makes him happy, to see his little ragtag pack so disciplined. Of course, there’s also a gap across from Malia where Lydia normally would be, and Mason’s at home with strep, and Liam and Hayden are off again this week so she’s giving him poisonous glances he most likely earned, plus Stiles is holding a metal bat that’s been anointed with virgin’s blood (“don’t ask,” he said at everyone’s questioning looks, and for once they obeyed), but they’re here and they’re ready to do what Scott asks. That’s about ten times more than he could’ve dreamed of back when Peter gave him the bite.

The only thing that’s the same is Stiles.

Scott goes up to the barred window where the check-in clerk sits and asks about the room in which they think the incubus is hiding. They wondered if they’d have to come up with a cover story for their interest in it, but the girl who sits on the ragged office chair isn’t interested in even looking up from her tablet, let alone asking questions. She tells them what they need to know—single occupancy, checked in two days ago and hasn’t left since as far as she knows—and then unpauses her video.

Together, they trail up the rusted stairs, Scott doing his best to be unobtrusive about the way he keeps his hand hovering beneath Stiles’ elbow in case one of the metal steps gives way entirely. Outside Room 12, they press up against the wall and listen. No heartbeat. Either the demon is in there alone, or it’s already killed its prey and is just hanging out.

“Should we knock?” Liam whispers.

Stiles gives him a withering look. “Yeah, we should totally knock, demons are really into manners and _o-o-h my God_!” because the door swings open.

“I am into manners, actually,” the incubus says, in the mildest tones imaginable. “Do come in. It’s humid tonight.”

It turns out that, in fact, the incubus is one of the decent examples of its type. It feeds off of sexual activity, but it doesn’t need to have sex to survive, and it doesn’t feel the desire to force others to engage in it either. “I know your emissary’s father. Alain. He can vouch for me.” Two phone calls later, and everything’s sorted to the pack’s satisfaction.

In the Jeep on the way home, Scott doesn’t know what to say. The cologne’s faded a little bit but he can’t smell Stiles. It’s in moments like these that he realizes how deeply he’s come to depend on his werewolf senses. He settles for, “I’m glad you didn’t have to use the bat. It might come in handy later.”

Stiles snorts, keeping his eyes on the road. “Yeah, I’m sure there’ll be other creatures who get shriveled up by virgin blood on aluminum. Only a matter of time.”

What’s worrisome is that, even though he tries to sound sarcastic, Scott can tell he means it. “The past couple weeks have sucked. It’s gotta get better sometime, right? There’s a limited number of monsters in the world.”

“And an unlimited number of ways they want to kill us, usually. How bad is it, that I’m almost let down by the fact that a sex demon turned out to not be interested in murder?”

“Probably pretty bad.” Scott had run through possible scenarios before they even left Deaton’s office, and the most likely one had been an involuntary pack orgy. That had also been the one most likely to kill them all, so he was glad it wouldn’t happen. On the other hand, if it _hadn’t_ killed them all, it would’ve been a decent way to see how Stiles felt about the whole making out thing, after the fact.

“I’m still not fully convinced it was telling the truth.”

Scott shrugged. “If you want, we can follow it to the next place it goes. It said it was leaving Beacon Hills before the week’s out.”

Stiles agrees it’s a good idea, so when Braeden texts that she’s in town, they ask her to trail the demon when it goes.

 _It’s at a honeymoon resort. For couples only,_ she texts within five hours.

When Scott forwards the text to Stiles, who’s holed up at home, working his way down his summer reading list before classes start in the fall, Stiles replies, _So we need two people to pretend to be a couple, sneak in, and check it out._

That shouldn’t make Scott’s heart jump to attention in his chest with a thump, but it does. He flicks his thumb across the keyboard. _You and me, you mean?_

Before he can hit send, the phone buzzes with another text from Stiles. _You should go meet up with Braeden._

Oh. Right. That makes sense.

_OK._

He tries not to think about pretending to be married to Stiles all the way there.

 

Stiles checks his phone when it buzzes for the millionth time, even though he knows what the message will say. Something along the lines of _Gnomes! Little garden gnomes! The kind that kill you with their little garden tools!_

He’s in hiding, but that won’t really work, will it, when he’s the one who just found out from Chris Argent’s bestiary that the only way to take a gnome out is to destroy its bolt-hole, usually found somewhere in the lawn where it was originally planted. Which most often is found on a ley line. And _which_ ley line is going to be tough to figure out, especially since Liam “misplaced” that map that he ripped out of the library book a while back. Stiles could just call someone and tell them what to print out, but then they’ll all know for sure that something’s wrong, and if there’s one thing the pack is bad at, it’s leaving a problem alone to work itself out. They get that from their alpha.

He can’t break another bottle of cologne. He’s kind of surprised that Scott didn’t notice it wasn’t his usual brand when they were at Deaton’s, given that Scott isn’t even close to Danny and still knew he wore Armani. Stiles couldn’t swallow shattering Terre d’Hermes, though—a birthday present from Lydia—so he knocked over his dad’s Old Spice instead. (The sheriff was thrilled about _that_ one, and it wasn’t like Stiles could explain, “Dad, there’s one supernatural sniffer in particular I’m really invested in _not_ finding out that I want to make out with its owner.” He bought his dad a new bottle with money he didn’t have, because he was so busy fighting things that he couldn’t find time to get a summer job until it was too late.) What he needs is a plan, and while Scott is the real planner in their relationship, Stiles has learned a thing or two from him.

So he texts Scott to let him know they have a solution, and when he pulls up in front of the McCall house, where everyone else is gathered, he calls the three brats, as he probably shouldn’t refer to Mason, Liam, and Hayden—who are back on, although Liam’s on probation still—into the Jeep before Scott can do more than wave. Malia hops onto Braeden’s motorcycle, joking about riding bitch. Scott’s been making noises about buying a car of his own, which he can probably afford since he’s going to community college this year, but he hasn’t wanted to spend the money.

As Scott straddles his bike, Stiles has to look away and take a few deep breaths so the werewolves in his car don’t pick up on anything. What the hell, does Scott _have_ to have shoulders that could carry the entire world? Is it a requirement? He could stand to be a little more considerate of people with human limitations.

He probably doesn’t succeed with the “don’t pick up on anything” goal, because Hayden gives Liam a dirty look and shoves his shoulder. “Ugh. Gross! Quit it.”

“What’d I do?” Liam protests.

Stiles puts Roscoe in gear before she can answer. “Okay, to the nemeton. Everybody hope real hard that it wants to be found tonight.” Not that hope’s ever been anything other than palliative, but whatever, they’re still young, they might trust him enough to try.

As it turns out, the nemeton thinks gnomes are just as freaky as the pack does, or at least that’s what he assumes based on the speed with which it presents itself. They’re able to trace down the ley line after only a few false starts, and they can actually take roads to the right place, and after that it’s time to pour kerosene in the bolt-hole and light it on fire, which is something everyone enjoys a little too much. And, okay, it’s kind of creepy-sad that the gnome melts five feet away from them while screaming like the Wicked Witch from Oz, but then again it _did_ murder an entire family of landscapers so there’s nothing to be done.

It’s almost as if Scott’s been waiting for Stiles to reach for his keys in his pocket, because the instant he does, Scott says, “Hey, Liam, catch!” and tosses his own keys to his beta.

Liam looks at the keys, then at Hayden, who shrugs, and they take off together before Stiles even realizes what’s happened. Malia says “I wanna hunt,” then disappears into the woods again, and Braeden offers to take Mason home. He accepts, and it’s just Scott and Stiles.

It’s like they _want_ him to completely ruin his own life.

All right. No need to panic. Sure, they’re about fifty minutes away from home since they can’t just drive through the preserve back to Beacon Hills. And yes, due to the fire and warm summer night air, Scott’s kind of sweaty in a way that really makes his shirt cling to his _unfairly lickable chest_ , it’s an affront to _decency,_ Stiles’ father should _arrest him_. But hey. At least the Jeep’s open-air so the pheromones won’t turn into a thick cloud of _Your Best Bud Wants to Touch Your Dick_ warning signals. And he’s an expert at babbling when he doesn’t actually want to discuss anything.

Accordingly, as soon as they’re both buckled in, he cuts off Scott’s attempt at conversation with, “So hey, that was easier than expected. Between the nemeton wanting us to take care of the garden gnome problem and that incubus a couple days ago, we’re gonna end up spoiled. Nobody got maimed or anything.”

Scott gives him a smile, but there’s something weird going on with his face when he does, and that pushes Stiles’ monologue into overdrive, because they’ve never been able to keep much from each other, and what if he gave something away _before_ he knew? What if Scott knew first? Not that it’s _likely_ , but sometimes, and only when it comes to Stiles, Scott knows things in a way that completely bypasses thought.

“I mean, imagine if we hadn’t had the previous two months to make sure we never, ever forget that we’re all constantly knocking at death’s door, the brats would’ve been lulled into a false sense of ‘hey, maybe we’ll all survive Beacon Hills,’ so it’s probably a good thing that the Hellmouth opened first, but we need a decent threat soon or we might all take a deep breath, and God knows what’ll happen to us then, the oxygen overload might shut our brains down before the monster that’s waiting in the wings takes us all out—”

“Wait,” Scott interrupts, attention sharpening from whatever he wanted to say to focus on Stiles’ words. “Wait, what are you saying?”

In point of fact, Stiles has no idea what he was saying, but as he runs through the last couple of seconds, he remembers that he has _two_ things he doesn’t want Scott to find out about, and in his efforts to obscure one, he’s just made the other crystal clear. “I-I—”

“Tell me you weren’t serious.” Scott’s leaning toward him now, and he looks almost angry. “Tell me you don’t believe that.”

Years of practice comes to Stiles’ aid in misdirecting from an outright lie. Werewolf lie detectors are more trouble than they’re worth. “Don’t believe what? I wasn’t even listening to myself. Did you see how that little rake the gnome was carrying—”

“Stiles, stop.” Technically, Scott’s Alpha voice doesn’t work on Stiles, but when he uses that particular tone, Stiles usually listens anyway. Even though he doesn’t mean to, force of habit snaps his mouth shut. Scott goes on, “You don’t, do you?”

Stiles gestures helplessly, words failing him when he needs them most, stuck in a ball of indeterminate consonants at the back of his throat. Convenient.

“Oh my God, you do. Stiles…” Scott collapses back on the seat like he’s taken a lacrosse ball to the gut. “Is this the reason—I mean, I wondered, but I didn’t ask because I _wanted_ it—but, is this why you didn’t go to any of those universities that accepted you? Why you’re staying here longer?”

Anything Stiles would say right now would be a lie, so he clenches his jaw shut and concentrates on the road.

“Do you really think there’s no hope?”

Underneath Scott’s question, Stiles can hear the answer, can hear Allison, so careful and sure: _There’s always hope, Scott_. And for some reason that makes the tangle that’s always gathering in his chest _snap_ , it just spirals outward like a poisonous snake and spills venom from his lips. “Okay, yeah, that is actually what I think, Scott, I really believe that we are never going to live to legal drinking age, let alone graduate from college on time, and sometimes I hear myself talking to my dad about my supposed _future_ in law enforcement and I want to puke or laugh or something, anything that makes sense, because I can tell you, believing in a future where we live and _don’t die_ , where we kill everything that comes after us before it can kill us, is the most nonsensical thing I can think of during those moments. I’m taking classes because that’s what you’re supposed to do, and I’m fighting evil because there’s no way in _hell_ you’re going out there without me, and I go to bed and I wake up and I crack jokes and there’s nothing—there’s nothing—” Shit, that tight feeling in his chest is something he’d almost persuaded himself to forget, but it’s the sort of memory that never really fades, and the instant the stabbing pain in his lungs lances through his chest, he knows what’s going on and it’s too late to stop it. This is the culmination of the past two months, coiled to strike now that there’s no fresh horror to distract him. “There’s nothing to—” he tries again, but the words come out wheezy and thin.

From miles away, he hears Scott cursing, moving to take over the wheel. Stiles sort of falls into the back seat so Scott can pull the Jeep over to the side of the road. The engine shuts off and Stiles curls up, trying to breathe around the hurt.

“Hey.” Scott clambers in back too, and puts an arm around him. Stiles can’t find the wherewithal to pull away. In fact, he finds himself burrowing deeper into Scott’s heat. That calm certainty that’s been a part of Scott ever since the True Alpha thing happened pours into Stiles’ skin. It steadies the cells that seem never to stop jangling against one another. His nose is pressed so hard to the juncture of Scott’s neck and shoulder that it gives a twinge of protest, and that tiny pain relieves the vise clamped on his chest.

He gasps, and this time gets some air. “Last time—last time this happened to me, Lydia kissed me. I feel like she commits to the responsibilities of friendship more than you.”

He means it as a joke, or he eighty percent means it that way, but Scott doesn’t even hesitate. “I can do that too, if it helps. If you want.”

 _Do you want?_ Stiles thinks about asking. He nuzzles Scott’s collarbone instead. He’s got Scott’s shirttail in one fist and the fingers of his other hand dug into Scott’s shoulder and he really, really doesn’t want to let go. They’re at an uncomfortable angle but it doesn’t matter.

Scott lets out a heavy sigh and shuffles back on the seat to lean against the side of the Jeep, taking Stiles with him. “You should’ve told me. That you felt that way, I mean.”

It comes out dry and cracked as the desert floor. “Yeah.” Because he knows, secrets between them never produce any good things. But he also knew Scott would try to help, try to fix it, and he doesn’t want that.

At any moment Stiles is going to have to get back in the driver’s seat and pretend he’s got some control. That moment’s got to wait. Just until he can breathe without it hurting, without hearing Scott crying in the shower and trying to hide it for months after Allison whispered her goodbyes. It doesn’t even ache the majority of the time, anymore. Every day, but not all day. He can sleep more nights than not. The resignation to dying kind of helped with that, but he doesn’t know how to explain. “It’s part of me now. It won’t go away. I don’t want it to.”

Even a year ago, he knows Scott would have argued. Tonight, he just nods, cheek pressed to Stiles’ hair, and wraps his other arm around Stiles, one thumb making comforting semi-circles at his waist where the shirt’s ridden up.

Stiles is feeling well enough to have to battle the urge to run his tongue up Scott’s neck to his ear, which is shitty of him since Scott’s offering honest comfort, but at least it means they won’t have to spend the night on the shoulder. He steels himself to pull away.

Scott lets him, and goes with him to the front seats. Stiles starts the Jeep up again and checks his mirror before easing back onto the road. They make the rest of the trip in silence, but right before Stiles pulls into Scott’s driveway, Scott puts his hand on Stiles’ thigh (is that a thing they do? Did they start doing it and Stiles just never noticed? That sounds likely) and pats him.

“Hey, dude. It’s okay, that you feel that way. I’m sorry I got mad. I just… I really like having you alive, you know? Sometimes I think maybe you don’t feel the same way.”

“Yeah.” And then Stiles fucks up again , because he puts his hand around Scott’s and squeezes it in a way that is definitely not bro-ish. His brain catches up an instant later, but before he can pull back, Scott flips his hand in Stiles’ grip and returns it. It’s a good thing Stiles’ heartbeat hasn’t stopped fluttering like a trapped hummingbird since before, otherwise Scott wouldn’t be able to miss it. He can barely come to a stop without braking hard enough to send them both at the windshield. Amazingly, his voice stays steady. “I’ll make a deal with you, okay? As long as you’re alive, I’m sticking around. If I have any say about it, anyway.”

Stiles can tell Scott wants to insist on “even after you’re dead, I’ll try,” but after a visible fight with himself, he gives a quick nod. “Okay. Deal.” His thumb’s doing the little semi-circle thing again. If he doesn’t jump out of the Jeep soon, Stiles is going to lift that thumb to his mouth and kiss it, and that’ll be absolutely terrible, so, even though he can’t bring himself to be the first to let go, he says, “See ya. Text me if anything comes up.”

Maybe he isn’t recovered from that panic attack after all, because the air in the Jeep seems to have gone sort of thick and sticky, and his skin still has that tingly feeling making his arm hair stand on end. And Scott still hasn’t moved, although he’s staring at his house with a furrow between his eyebrows like he has a problem he’s still working on. He’s got to be exhausted. Keeping the brats in line along with fighting evil incarnate every day can wear an Alpha down.

Stiles doesn’t move either. It seems unfair to kick the guy out when he’s that tired.

“Okay.” Scott nods and reaches for the door handle with his free hand. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah, probably.” Except for the fact that Stiles will be avoiding him some more.

Scott gives him a funny look. Maybe Stiles’ pulse is back to normal, enough to hear the lie. He still doesn’t get out, although the door’s open now and he’s got one foot hanging out in the air.

And he still hasn’t let go of Stiles’ hand.

“Get some sleep,” Stiles says in desperation. He might not have werewolf senses, but he can damn near _see_ the pheromones floating toward Scott’s nose like tiny chemical weapons.

“Okay,” Scott says again. This time he lets go.

Once the front door of the house shuts behind him, Stiles rests his forehead on the steering wheel and groans. Scott can think whatever he likes about the sound. He needs a minute.

 

“Wait, so, you like Stiles?” Hayden says, two days after the garden gnome melting.

Scott straightens up from the lower kitchen cabinet so fast that he bangs his head on an open door above him. “Shit! What? Who says?”

“Liam,” she replies, like, _duh_ , and to be fair it was a stupid question. He was stalling for time. “I’m pretty sure he likes you back, though. Did you ask him?”

Scott considers denying the whole thing. He can keep the betas from sensing the giveaways for a lie. But there’s no point. “No, I didn’t ask him. Here, open this can of beans.”

She gives him a look of utter betrayal. “You’re gonna make me eat _vegetables_? What’s the point of having a perfect werewolf self-healing body if you don’t get to skip gross health food?”

He grins down at her. “How about if I make you follow my mom’s old two-bites rule? Is that better?” Stiles is actually the one who got him to eat vegetables when they were younger, although not on purpose. The panic attacks got so bad that Stiles couldn’t function, just after his mom’s funeral, and they got worse every time his dad skipped vegetables at dinner. Then it turned into every time _Scott_ skipped them too. So Scott would clean his plate, whenever they ate together, even though back then the texture of green beans made him want to gag. The panic faded but the vegetable habit didn’t.

 _I should have known then._ He stares at the counter, idly tracing a grain of rice that’s dried to its surface. How could he have known, though? He grew up with all these feelings jumbled together inside whenever he hung out with Stiles, and their familiarity tricked him into thinking they were simple.

He maybe should have known when Theo talked his way between them, and it left a literal _hole_ in his chest. Before then, he never seriously contemplated the possibility of life without Stiles. Finding out it could happen was a shock. But it was easy to explain as needing the pack to be together, and he never stopped to think that having a regular human’s absence affect his magical healing probably was odd. He made Stiles a real member of his pack, not just a de facto one, by sheer force of will. That had to be weird.

He’s not sure he can heal from another wound like that, if he fucks this up.

“Um, Scott?” Hayden nudges his elbow. “Sorry. I’ll eat them.”

“No, I know.” Sighing, he reaches for the oven mitts and then freezes. The ground’s trembling.

The others, in the living room, feel it too, except Mason, who’s looking at everyone with puzzlement. “Should we get under the table?” Liam calls, half-joking.

The sensation fades, and then repeats a couple of seconds later, and then again, and again, and now even Mason is holding onto the arm of the couch with his eyes getting big. “That’s not an earthquake. That’s something walking.”

Scott grabs his phone and calls Stiles, who barely gets out a greeting before Scott interrupts with, “Where are you? _Where are you?_ ”

“Whoa, dude, chill, I’m at home. What’s… Oh shit. That isn’t an earthquake, is it. And—”

Stiles’ gulp is so loud that the betas’ expressions go to dread. Scott fights the concern down and asks, “Yeah?”

“Pretty sure it’s a troll. Because I can see it. Out on my street.”

Scott’s mind flies to _The Fellowship of the Ring,_ which Stiles forced him to sit through about ten times. “Is it like in the movies?” Hayden, Malia, and Liam are already halfway to him when he darts for the door. He hears Mason grabbing his keys and phone as he crosses the lawn.

“No, it’s about half as big and it looks a hell of a lot more phlegmy.”

“Smaller is good!” He has _got_ to get a car. Hayden has a heap of shit that’s actually faster than Liam or her, and Mason’s got a much nicer model, but an Alpha can outpace them with ease (and doesn’t need roads), so he runs.

“Phlegmy is bad, though.” Stiles has gone super calm. “Don’t freak out.”

“Yeah, kinda too late for that. What?”

“It’s, uh, it’s sniffing. At my front door.”

“I’ll be there in a minute.”

A loud crash, followed by a roar. “Minute might not be soon enough.” And the call drops.

Scott strips and leaves his clothes and phone in the gutter as he transforms into the wolf. Malia’s already gone to full coyote mode on his heels.

By the time he gets to the Stilinskis’ house, the door’s on the front lawn and Stiles is gone. They catch up with the troll just outside of the Preserve, Stiles flopping around in its grip. He looks like a nightmare Scott’s had too many times.

Scott snarls, whipping his head toward a flutter of movement behind a nearby tree. It vanishes back into the shadows, but he’s already pegged the scent. It’s one of the witches from the coven they offended way back in February.

It turns out that one of the casualties of that misunderstanding was a familiar, named Mr. Fluffins, and the very young witch Camilla who summoned the troll is out for revenge against the guy who ran over her cat. The troll’s appeased with the offering of a few bunnies to play with, and the witch’s mother appears in time to save everybody but Stiles from serious damage. Scott’s on the ground next to Stiles in human form, checking him for a punctured lung, when the witch beckons the troll to head with her back to its home cave. “I’m sorry about your emissary, Scott,” she says before they leave.

“He’s not even my emissary,” Scott mutters, still angry about the entire thing.

She gives him an incredulous look. “What other reason does a human have to be around a bunch of wild creatures like you?”

Stiles wheezes a laugh. Scott takes advantage of his momentary incapacitation to cradle his face in one hand. “I’m not sure, actually,” he says, and then wonders why Stiles looks sad.

“Camilla owes my dad a new door,” Stiles says. This has to be a new record length of time that he’s refrained from making any jokes about Scott’s junk being close to his face.

“Oh, please.” The witch walks toward the woods, the troll lumbering in her wake. “You got off easy and you know it.”

After the reverberations fade, Mason tosses some clothes at Scott. “Here. I asked for your mom to keep an extra outfit in my trunk.”

Scott lays Stiles back down on the ground with care and grabs the shorts first. “Thanks.”

“I called your mom and told her about having to leave,” Liam says. “Can we go back and eat now? Is that okay?”

“As long as she rescued her meatloaf we should be good.” Scott pulls his shirt over his head. “I’ll meet you guys back there.”

“ _We’ll_ meet you guys back there.”

“Stiles, you shouldn’t—”

Stiles blows out a heavy breath and just lies there, eyes closed. “Scott, I swear to God, you need to shut up.”

He doesn’t even sound angry. Just tired.

Everyone else clears out, and they start back together. Scott walks in silence. When Stiles gets like this, it takes him a few minutes to say what he needs to. It usually ends up hurting and helping in equal measure. He’s holding his side like maybe he’s got a cracked rib, too, and that might be slowing the proceedings.

“‘I’m not sure, actually?’” he finally says.

Scott can’t place the quote for a second. “Oh. I mean, I know _why_ —because it’s the right thing to do. I just meant there doesn’t seem to be much in it for you.”

Stiles laughs, a tiny, faded fragment of sound. “There never seemed to be much in it for you, either. But here we are.”

Scott knows he shouldn’t, because he means something by it that Stiles doesn’t get, but he puts his arm around Stiles’ waist anyway and subtly checks for pain. It feels healthy enough, all lithe muscle like the rest of Stiles’ body. “Yeah.”

Stiles wraps his arm around Scott’s shoulders like they do this every day. They don’t. They never walk like this for longer than a second unless one of them’s too wounded to move under his own power. “I don’t do it because it’s the right thing to do.”

That’s not strictly true, because Stiles isn’t (quite) as amoral as he’d like to be. But Scott knows what he means. _I’m fighting evil because there’s no way in_ hell _you’re going out there without me._ So he settles for, “I know.”

They look for Scott’s phone before Stiles goes home. For a wonder, it’s still in the gutter with his clothes, so that’s one less thing for his mom to worry about. They could split up there, but Scott walks Stiles back to his house. Right before they turn the corner onto his block, Scott asks, “Why didn’t you want to come to dinner, tonight?”

“Oh, you know. Brats being bratty.”

Scott nods, accepting it even though he can hear it’s not the whole truth. Learning to answer without making his heartbeat jump can only take Stiles so far.

“Remember how I got pissed at you for taking my pain every time I got hurt? Remember what I said?”

“You said humans need pain to tell them what not to do, so they don’t get hurt worse.”

“Yeah.” Stiles stops, even though they’re still several houses down from his own. “I remember what you said, too. Sometimes pain teaches you what not to do, and then you stop doing it even after you’re healed and it wouldn’t hurt to try. Sometimes pain doesn’t teach you good lessons.”

“I sound kind of like an arrogant asshole,” Scott ventures, and Stiles smiles, still not making eye contact.

“Nah. I think maybe you were right.”

His arm’s slipped down a little, and he’s playing with the hair at the nape of Scott’s neck, almost like he doesn’t realize what he’s doing. Scott wishes he would keep doing it for pretty much forever. Then he starts thinking about what Stiles’ fingers would look like caressing _other_ body parts, and yeah, no, he should leave before he does something he can’t back down from.

Stiles doesn’t move away. He doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to wash the overpowering troll stink off. He doesn’t seem to care that they’re basically full-body cuddling right out on the street, either. He gnaws at his lower lip as the sheriff pulls up to the house from the opposite direction, but even that doesn’t move his attention from whatever he’s thinking.

Finally, he nods, one weary move of surrender, and mutters, “Yeah, all right, fuck it.”

And then he bends to kiss Scott, and Scott’s so shocked that his brain can’t even form words anymore. His consciousness is reduced to random segments of fractured awareness:

the barely-there nudge of Stiles’ nose against his cheek

the tremble of his hand as he cards through Scott’s hair

the softness of his mouth

the gentle dig of the fingers of his other hand into Scott’s waist, pulling them flush up against each other

the way Stiles whimpers as their tongues brush

and that’s what snaps the fragments together into one cohesive picture. He slides his hands up to Stiles’ neck and kisses back, all eagerness, every emotion that he’s been trying to figure out how to handle flooding in from all directions until he’s halfway convinced that Stiles must be able to feel it too, that love is leaking from his fingertips and radiating from his chest, because he does, he loves Stiles _so much—_

But then Stiles stops and doesn’t even look at him, just staggers back as if the ground’s gone tilted and breathes out, “Okay then,” then walks, in an unsteady zigzag, toward his house.

Scott nearly falls down without Stiles to support him. He needs to go after him and ask what the hell that was, but he can’t move because his legs are overcooked spaghetti. Also he’s half-hard and he’s pretty sure all his blood is still heading in the general direction of his dick, because his mind is fogged over and he can’t think what to do next.

The sheriff is surveying the door in the lawn, one hand rubbing the back of his neck, and Stiles is trying to explain. Scott takes a very small consolation from the fact that his voice sounds completely wrecked.

Scott turns around and walks home.

As soon as he gets to the door, his mom greets him with, “Look who’s here!” and he jerks his head up to see Lydia smiling at him.

“It turns out I couldn’t stand to be within fifty miles of Jackson.” Her expression slides into a frown. “Why are you still bleeding?”

He glances down at his shirt, where ten tiny crescents have seeped through the fabric. “Witch’s nails. It’ll probably take longer to heal.” Mindful of getting blood near her dress, he pulls her into a side-hug. “I’m really glad you’re back.”

“I barely rescued the meatloaf,” his mom tells him, “but it’s still edible. C’mon, wash up, everyone’s already at the table.” She bustles into the kitchen.

Lydia makes no move to let him go. Instead, she supports him, frown still firmly in place. “What’s wrong?”

Scott tries to tell her, but he ends up leaning on the wall and sliding down until he sits on the floor. She follows him, curling her legs beneath her as if it’s perfectly normal for the queen of Beacon Hills to kneel. Her eyebrows scrunch together with worry.

“Are we gonna die?” he asks her. It’s not the first time.

Some of the worry smooths out into understanding. “Not anytime soon.” One manicured hand pats his. “Were you scared it would happen when I wasn’t around to warn you? Is that what this is about?”

“I wasn’t, but…” He speaks slowly, still coming to a conclusion. “I think Stiles is. I think maybe he thinks good things have to be balanced with, like, twice as many bad things.”

“That’s a messed-up scale he’s got in his mind.” Lydia shrugs. “But then again, we _are_ talking about Stiles. Why are we talking about Stiles?”

“I’m in love with him.” Saying it out loud doesn’t change anything, but it feels huge all the same.

Lydia’s inured to the moment. “Everybody knows that. Except possibly Stiles.” He gives her a weary side-eye, and she amends, “Except _probably_ Stiles.”

“I might’ve given it away tonight.” But then again maybe not. Stiles isn’t used to expecting good things to happen.

Scott _hopes_ this is a good thing.

Lydia purses her lips impatiently. “Did you actually say words? ‘Stiles, I’m in love with you?’”

“He kissed me.”

“That’s him saying he’s in love with you, not the other way around.” She skips right over any other possible interpretations, and he notices, but it doesn’t make him feel better.

“And then he just walked away and didn’t let me say anything.”

“Oh.” She leans against the wall too. “I see the problem now.”

“Yeah.”

Lydia rearranges her limbs so they’re facing outward, together. “This never would’ve happened if I’d been here. I was hoping that waiting till end of senior year to break things off with him would give him enough time to be ready, but maybe I should have waited till you were too.”

His mind stutters to a halt, picks up the pieces, and fits them together, all in about sixty seconds. “Oh.” Then, to be fair, “I was ready. I just wasn’t ready to say so. You weren’t wrong.”

She tilts her head against his shoulder. “I’m not leaving.”

It’s so far out of the realm of what he expected that he starts. Lydia winds her arm around his and holds on. He wants to howl with delight and relief, and rub his face all over her till she doesn’t smell like airport and not-pack, but those weird wolf urges are easier to tamp down nowadays. Responsibility makes him say, “You should. You shouldn’t stay here just because—”

“Just because here’s where I’m needed? This is my choice. I’ll commute to a college within a few hours of here—there are a couple I could choose from. I’m going to double-major. Math and psychology. We’re going to need therapy after all this is over anyway. I might as well see if I’m the one who can do it.”

Scott snorts. “As if you can’t do anything you want.”

“Exactly.” She rubs her cheek into his upper arm, so maybe she knows what he wants, too. “And right now, I want to make sure you and Stiles are happy. Give me an hour, okay? Go eat with the others. I’ll be back.”

For the first time since she left, Scott lets himself believe that everything’s going to be okay.

 

Stiles hears Lydia’s heels coming up the stairs and runs to his bedroom door with his towel still draped over his wet hair, gaping in disbelief. “Lydia! I wondered why your Instagram was so quiet. What the hell are you doing here?”

She gives him an unimpressed look. “Coming to fix everything that went wrong while I was gone, apparently. Where’s your front door?”

“Oh, you know. Troll.” He backs into his bedroom again and motions her in. “How are you? How was Cambridge?” Lydia ignores the questions in favor of sitting on the edge of the bed and fixing him with a stare that strips him down to naked and afraid. “Uh…”

“Explain what you just did to Scott.”

Stiles gapes at her for a second. “He _told_ you about that? You can’t have been home for longer than like 20 minutes!” Her gaze doesn’t waver. He throws the towel on his desk chair and rubs the back of his neck. “I didn’t… expect him to react the way that he did.” Scott was supposed to gape at him, or maybe shove him and ask _what the hell was_ that, _dude,_ or maybe get that worried look that meant he had to tell someone something that was going to hurt their feelings. He wasn’t supposed to silently say _I want you too, I’ve wanted you for so long_ with every kiss. Stiles can still feel the caress of Scott’s thumb, tracing his jawline. “He took me by surprise.”

“So you ran away? Smooth, Stilinski.” Lydia taps one peach-painted nail on his footboard. It’s not an impatient sound so much as a thoughtful one. “I think you should know that I’m staying in Beacon Hills, at least part-time.”

“Wha—Lydia, that’s great! Except, no, it’s not, you’ve been dreaming about Cambridge literally half your life—”

She waves that away. “Having a hole drilled in your head and being able to destroy demons with your voice tends to put even the Fields Medal in perspective. Trust me, if this weren’t my own idea, I’d reject it. And stop changing the subject. I’m staying, so you have an early death warning system.”

Oh.

Lydia waits for him to speak, but he doesn’t have anything to say. His last defense, gone.

“I know I’m not foolproof, but I’m better than I used to be. And you have to stop believing that things are just going to get worse and worse until we die. You’re not going to screw this up. Dating Scott won’t turn into some downward spiral of doom. Please stop binge-watching _Buffy_.”

A long silence, while the space between them fills up with _I don’t know how to trust this._ He knows she can hear it, as clearly as she hears the dead whispering.

“Stiles.” She pats the mattress next to her, and he moves to her side. “Malia told me a little about what’s been going on since I was gone, and how easily you’ve handled everything. It was better, right? Than before graduation?”

“Yeah.”

“Peter didn’t even kill anybody this time. That poor girl had to go to the hospital, but she’s not a banshee and he’s not an Alpha anymore, so it worked out all right.”

Stiles slumps into her side, because she’s right but his feelings aren’t catching up to reality.

Lydia folds her lips in on themselves. “Look. I understand a lot more now than I used to, about life, and death, and the way those things tie together. It’s part of my job. Right?”

It shouldn’t be, but it is, and if she can view it with calm acceptance then so can he. “Right.”

“It’s like math.” He snorts, but she insists, “It _is_. When you’re looking at a scatter plot without the axes, it seems like random dots, but once you have a frame of reference, you can start to find a pattern. I’ve got my frame of reference now. Allison’s death was an outlier.” She knits her hands together and stares down, knuckles white. “Think about all the horrible things we’ve endured, before and after that. How many times did someone who was in Scott’s pack die? He makes us better than the sum of our parts. As long as we’re with him—as long as we’re all together—we’ll be okay. Things will get dark and sad, but we’ll be okay. I really believe it.” She shrugs. “You should listen to me. I talk to dead people.”

The light from the desk lamp throws shadows under her cheekbones and eyes, making her look like a sign and a portent. It invests her words with gravity and drives them through the doubt like one of Allison’s arrows through a cloud.

He blinks, and she’s Lydia again.

“I love you,” he says finally.

“Don’t take this as a Han Solo reference, but I know.”

Stiles gasps. “Lydia.” She groans and flops backward onto his bed, covering her eyes with one forearm. “C’mon, Lydia, how am I _not_ gonna take that as a Han Solo reference? You know me better than that.”

She speaks without moving her arm. “Stiles, go see Scott. Go kiss Scott. And never, ever tell me about it. And by the way, I’ve got jet lag so I’m probably going to fall asleep right here.”

“Right. Okay.” He jerks to his feet and rubs his palms against his thighs. They’ve gone sweaty at the thought of Scott. “Going now. See ya.”

Scott’s standing outside when he gets there, and for a second Stiles wonders if Lydia texted him, but then he realizes that of course Scott just knew and was listening. Or maybe he was hoping. Either way, it comes down to Scott, waiting for him.

His heartbeat leaps into overdrive as soon as they make eye contact. (What was it like, before, not noticing every single bodily response to stimuli, knowing exactly what it told the supernatural people surrounding him? It seems like a dream.)

He forces his feet up the front walk and right in front of Scott, probably too close but he’s hoping it won’t be close enough in a minute. “Hey.”

Scott almost smiles. One corner of his mouth pulls upward, but his eyes are too serious. “Hey.”

“I shouldn’t’ve—” Stiles rubs the back of his neck and drops his gaze to the ground between their feet. “I shouldn’t’ve run away. That was—yeah, not one of my finer moments.”

“I’m in love with you.”

Stiles yanks his head back up so fast that he nearly gives himself whiplash. “What? You’re gonna lead with _that_? I was kind of—okay. Whoa. Um. I’ve gotta catch up now.”

“I wanted to say it first.” Scott edges closer. “Before you made any excuses or tried to pretend.”

“I’m not here to pretend!” He might not have a werewolf’s nose, but Scott smells good even to a regular human. He must’ve showered since they got back. “God, you’re really—” he whines, because it’s _a lot_ , and then snaps back into focus. “Uh. You. I’m in love with you. Too.”

The seriousness vanishes. Scott grins like Stiles just passed him the ball to shoot into the goal. “Yeah?”

Stiles rolls his eyes but can’t help grinning back. “C’mon, you had to know.”

Scott makes a sort-of gesture. “You’re really good about coming up with cover stories.” He reaches to touch Stiles’ face, and that’s new, something best friends don’t do, so Stiles kind of has no defense against it. His eyes slam shut and he makes a tiny sound in the back of his throat. “So… I’m gonna kiss you now, and you’re gonna stay, right?” Scott makes it sound like he’s teasing, but Stiles hears the sincerity of the question. He nods, as briefly as he can so Scott doesn’t move his hand away.

Scott’s other hand slides up his bicep, slow slow slow, like Stiles is an animal he needs to soothe into accepting his proximity, and Stiles appreciates the consideration, but this is too much to take, so he opens his eyes enough to make sure he’s aiming right and kisses Scott first. It’s better than the last time, partly because neither of them reeks like troll but more because neither of them thinks it might be _the_ last time. Stiles’ legs can barely hold him up after a second, especially when Scott grabs his hips and pulls them close against his own, and the friction that gives them is pretty much exactly what he needs—except—

He pulls his mouth away just enough to whisper. “We’re still in the front yard. I don’t want to scar your mom for life.”

Scott starts lazily planting tiny kisses up and down Stiles’ throat, so when he speaks, the words come out half-muffled. “Dude. We’re totally boyfriends. She’s gonna have to get used to it.”

“Oh fuck.” Stiles squeezes his eyes shut again and buries his face in Scott’s shoulder. “Don’t do that, I’ve still gotta face the whole pack and I can’t do that with a massive hard-on.” Scott’s hand drops to toy with the button on his jeans. Stiles feels his grin against his neck. “Scott. I’m not gonna lie and say I haven’t fantasized about this on about three hundred separate occasions, but you’ve gotta stop.”

Scott stops, not that he was serious about it anyway, but he brushes the backs of his fingers up under Stiles’ shirt, across his stomach, and yeah, they’re going to have to get naked as soon as possible because that’s just unfair. “Okay. We can stop.”

Now that he’s gotten Scott to agree, the idea loses all its appeal. “Or, we could climb up through your window and make out in your room first.”

Scott doesn’t even bother pointing out that the entire pack will be able to hear them. “Yeah, okay. That sounds better.”

They’re just standing there, smiling at each other instead of moving. “We should hurry, before the next emergency happens.”

“I’m not worried.” Scott pulls him back to kiss him again. Happiness eclipses every bit of darkness until all that’s left around Stiles’ heart is Scott, and he lets it have its way, because they’re both finally safe.


End file.
